21 thousand illegal water connections in the city alone

21 thousand illegal water connections in the city alone

Mangalore Today News Network

Mangaluru,Sep 18,2017: Mangaluru city gets an average of 160 MLD of water from its vented dam in Thumbe every day but the MCC could charge for only 60 MLD of water. The survey conducted by the Multi-Purpose Workers (MPW) of MCC revealed that there are large number of illegal water supply connections in the city. The survey conducted by the Mangaluru City Corporation (MCC) reveals that there are nearly 21,000 illegal water supply connections in the city.

MCC Public Health, Education and Social Justice Standing Committee member Deepak Poojari told TOI that though the city corporation’s records show that there are only 77,000 water supply connections in the city, the actual number of connections is nearly 98,000.

"The city corporation decided to conduct a survey through MPWs since there is a huge difference in the water being pumped to the city and the water cess we collect. MPWs conducted the urvey in all the 60 wards of the city and submitted a preliminary report indicating the presence of huge number of illegal water connections," Deepak said, adding that all the illegal water supply connections will be regularized after collecting penalty once the final report of the survey is out.

At present, the contract of issuing bills to consumers is entrusted to a private agency, he said. "The contract will ends in October. From November 1, the responsibility of issuing bills will be handed over to MPWs and they will be paid as per the minimum wages criteria. MPWs will issue bills to all the connections once in two months," Deepak said.

Recently, mayor Kavitha Sanil had requested all the consumers in the city to clear their dues to avoid disconnection of water supply. She had also warned that defaulters names will be published in media. As on August 10, the total due stood at Rs 13.86 crore. However, the corporation recovered dues of Rs 1.5 crore till September from over 53,000 consumers. The city corporation is yet to collect nearly Rs 12 crore.